


well you can't help but wonder why you can't help but love her

by r1ker



Category: In and Out (1997)
Genre: Kid Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-06
Updated: 2015-07-06
Packaged: 2018-04-07 22:00:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,473
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4279467
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/r1ker/pseuds/r1ker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>two becomes three.</p>
            </blockquote>





	well you can't help but wonder why you can't help but love her

**Author's Note:**

> my little gay redneck heart and i put a lot into this
> 
> george strait gave me the title for this, the best
> 
> #inandoutsquad

He doesn’t really know how the baby comes into their lives. All of a sudden, one day, Peter reports on a story about an orphanage in Indianapolis and the next day Peter’s pleading with him to help adopt the kid.

 

Peter gives him every little scrap of back-story he picked up on the girl, how long she’s been waiting in the place, the facts that kids take a long time to get adopted and the time that they’re in the orphanage can severely damage their psyches. Howard is still bewildered, not entirely turned away to the idea, and thinks. She’s two years old, and one thing he’s entirely afraid of is she.

He’s scared of kids; he’s ashamed to admit it for he works around them for eight hours a day. But the notion of having one that comes with him rather than leaving after a bell each afternoon is terrifying. He loves them, don’t get him wrong, but having one to raise and influence and teach and not forget to get from daycare in the afternoon incites a fear in him that’s unlike everything he’s ever felt before. For the longest time he tells Peter he doesn’t want to see any pictures of her, doesn’t want to relive that fear he knows is irrational and let it out on an innocent child by just losing it. After a while, listening to Peter let off at the mouth at how much of a magnificent character Howard is and what a great father he’d make, he starts to loosen up and soon, Peter comes home with her official file from the orphanage, a manila pack with all of her background information along with a small 3 by 5 picture.

He falls in love with her the minute he lays eyes on her. She’s a lot smaller than he pictured – _aren’t two-year-olds supposed to be bigger? Is something wrong with her that’s keeping her that small?_ – but Peter reassures him it’s due to living conditions in her former life. None of it will affect her in her new life while she’s under their care. Her name is Valentina, the unwanted child of two Brazilian people displaced in Indiana, and Howard can see her being theirs the moment the picture’s pressed into his shaking palm. He kicks himself mentally for even considering the notion that he was not worthy to be her father.

Peter beams when Howard finally nods, holds the picture tight in his hand. He starts thinking about a number of things to incur Peter’s input on – where they’ll put her, what her room and her place will be in their life here at home – but one floats to the top amidst the growing pile.

“What am I going to say to my parents?”

 

Peter shakes his head the moment that question has found its way out of Howard’s mouth. “You tell them plainly, ‘Mom, Dad, I adopted a child with Peter and it’s looking like she’s going to be with us for a while and it’d be a blessing if you helped out with babysitting once in a while.’”

Howard sighs, presses the tips of his fingers into the corner of his eyes. His mother longed for grandchildren for years, constantly prodding he and Emily to bless the earth with grandkids for her to love and spoil. Howard was, at the time, at a point in his career where it wouldn’t be a logical step to take. And Emily, oh, she was dealing with her own inner turmoil, a personal discourse that left her incapable of dealing with anyone other than she and Howard.

“After that wedding your mother came up to me,” Peter says matter-of-factly, leaning forward to take hold of one of Howard’s hands. “She looked at me, dead in the eye with that all-knowing mommy glance one gets when one has children, and says, ‘So, when are you going to find some grandchildren for me?’ I told her, ‘If I could give you children made of his and my DNA, I would in a heartbeat. Give him time.’ And I think seventeen months is plenty, don’t you?”

Howard draws in a large breath. “I was the only kid they could have so I’ve got to start with the grandkids pretty soon. They went through a lot of heartache to even get me. Peter, they lost three babies before they got me. I just showed up after months, years of suffering. Dad was 36 and Mom was 34, kind of on the tail end of her childbearing years. I was the last hope. Albeit, I was six weeks early and on the verge of premature death, but I like to think I made it through alright.”

“Valentina’s already endured enough sorrow for one lifetime. Her parents went through the same thing but they had children they couldn’t keep. We owe it to her to give her the life they couldn’t,” Peter reassures. He presses kisses into each of Howard’s palm and pinches his cheek. “You’re going to make a good dad. You already got the gleam in your eye and we haven’t even signed the paperwork yet. I owe you a coffee mug after we pick her up. You already have the outfit.”

“I’ve dressed like this my whole life,” Howard scoffs on the tail end of a laugh. “I happen to like it. She will, too.”

“She won’t judge you too much in the fashion department for the first couple of years.”

 

The next week, they ride to Indianapolis to put picture to reality. She’s waiting for them when they walk into the front of the orphanage, standing behind a set of country doors with both hands grasping the second part of the door. She peers up as best as she can, standing on her tippy toes, and smiles like the sun when she sets eyes on Howard. Her hands grab for him like it’s the only thing she knows how to do. He picks her up like she’s porcelain and holds her close in the way he’s seen so many others of his coworkers do with their children. She pulls back from his grasp and puts both of her hands on his cheeks.

“Hi, daddy,” Valentina greets with the smallest voice Howard’s ears have ever had the joy of catching. Peter stands just over her shoulder, watching tears collect on the borders of Howard’s eyes. She leans back in to embrace him when she sees that he’s sad for all the good reasons and Peter can’t resist ruffling her hair.

 

She can’t part with either of them when they go into the clerk’s office to file the official paperwork. Busying herself with Peter’s lapel pin, she focuses her attention on both of them at the same time, listening to both of their voices. She doesn’t hesitate at all to let them know her thoughts on what appears to be an arduous process. Screeching and interjecting as the clerk instructs them on what to sign next, all three adults can’t help but stop and laugh as she seems to want in on the process.

The first stage of adopting Valentina seems simple enough on paper – take her home, foster her for ninety days and prove that the two of them can provide an exemplary living condition, both physical and emotional, and then they’ll file a formal motion to adopt her. Then she’s brought before the court, given the name of the parent that will officially be adopting her (they’ve already decided it’ll be Peter, the first inquirer into the adoption, she’ll take his name but have Howard under the legal guardian category). Howard’s given one more leeway with his new daughter.

When her birth parents named her, they neglected to give her an official middle name. Howard finds this out and instantly one name comes to his mind. He hesitates to tell Peter, fears the laughter would be enough to cause a tectonic shift, but he does one day when she’s asleep in her crib.

“Since you’re going to be in the father category on her new birth certificate,” Howard begins, “I get to pick her middle name.”

“That’s fair enough. What’d you have in mind, bub?”

“Barbra.”

Peter’s face shatters and the deep creases in his brow and face from holding in laughter look to be increasingly painful as time ticks by. He laughs, a sound he tries to muffle given the sleeping baby upstairs, and hugs Howard, kisses the side of his head.

“You got it, pal. Valentina Barbra she is. You deal with the fallout when her classmates put two and two together at some point in her life.” Howard can tell the last sentence is a joke, Peter signing it off with a wink.

Almost like she’s heard her new name for the first time, Valentina makes a mad dash for the kitchen, scooting down every single one of the carpeted stairs. She’s unsteady in her rubber duck crib shoes, almost wiping out when her feet come into contact with the hardwood in the kitchen, but she manages to make it to Peter’s knees. He swings her up into his arms and flips her upside down, clutching her legs in the fold of one arm, relishing in her maddened giggles. Howard goes gray instantly, hands scrambling to cradle beneath her should she take a spill, and Peter just snickers, moves her back up into the crook of his elbow, keeping her tight in his arms the whole time.

“Don’t play ‘flip the baby,’ would you please,” Howard almost pleads, struggling to catch his breath. He relaxes when he sees her break into a series of mad giggles that aren’t even sounds, just breaths that crescendo into some of the most intense cackles he’s ever heard someone make.

“Is it ‘flip the baby’ when I do this?” Peter says, holds Valentina’s hands and hefts her into the air, right over her head. His grip strong and sure, no room at all for instability, she laughs like she’s losing it, shoulders shaking with giggles. He affixes her upright back in his arm carefully and Howard looks like he’s going to hit the floor any second.

Her maddened smiles break down into something softer when she puts her head on Peter’s shoulder.

“She loves daddy no matter how much he swings her around, doesn’t she?” Howard asks to the both of them and Valentina smiles, throws one arm around Peter’s neck to confirm the observation.

Never in Howard’s life has he felt more at home. It wasn’t when he came home from college after four months without the comfort of his bed. It most certainly wasn’t his first night with Emily, her half of the momentous occasion after their wedding spent weeping in the master bathroom. It’s this right here, his man and his girl.

He wouldn’t have it any other way.

Valentina meets the other Bracketts the next day. Howard’s parents come over in the late morning, both of them a bit out of the loop on the new-kid front, and the gasp that leaves Howard’s mother's mouth when she spots Valentina in the backyard playing is heartbreaking.

“Oh, is that her,” Bernice gasps, almost yanking off the doorknob to the French doors in an effort to get outside. “Oh, she’s a doll. An absolute doll, how is she real?” She laughs, exhilarated, as the little girl trots up to greet her, putting her toys down on the ground for a few minutes. Her purse is forgotten in a lawn chair as she kneels down to pick up her granddaughter. Valentina wraps both arms around her neck, much like she did to Howard on that first day, and Howard can see through the screen door that Valentina says something along the lines of “Hi, granny.”

Even Howard’s dad, ever the man and a little cautious around children (from what his wife would confirm later, he never carried Howard standing up), seems a little caught up in the sight of his granddaughter in his wife’s arms. Bernice isn’t letting Valentina go even for a second. She puts the girl on her knee and braids the black hair curling at her neck, twisting it around her fingers affectionately. She looks up at Howard once, tears threatening to spill from her eyes as she pulls her grandbaby close. Frank kneels by his wife to get a better look at his granddaughter and it seems that she already knows who he is just based on his appearance.

One hand on his cheek, she smiles, “Hey there, Papa.”

Valentina goes to Howard when the five of them reconvene to have lunch inside, sitting on his lap and right up to the table to be fully involved in lunchtime chat. She steals grapes from his plate and when she feels bad about taking them, offers a few to him as an apology. Howard finds it hard to keep up a conversation with his mother and have a two-year-old stuff grapes nearly up his nose. He takes the grapes as best as he can, getting more than he can handle, and she laughs when he hands them right back, balancing a few on her nose.

Howard’s father takes a straw and blows the wrapping paper in her direction, landing squarely in the tangles of her hair, and she startles humorously, reaching up to grasp it. She tries to toss it back to him and it falters, lands on the edge of his glass of tea. When that won’t work, she blows a raspberry in his direction and he does the same. Howard looks around the table, glance going a full 360 and back to the baby in his lap. He’s good. This, right here and right now, is everything.

 

She becomes theirs three months later, a few weeks shy of her third birthday. She gets gussied up for the official adoption courtesy of Howard’s mother and a daylong shopping trip to the Indianapolis Mall, her lilac dress billowing out from the fold of Peter’s arms as he holds her when they all walk into the courtroom. Peter is all business with his boyfriend at one side and his daughter in his arms, having been the keeper of the documents and papers during this whole experience. He presents each file to the judge as it is asked for, impressing the man with his formality. Soon, a decision is reached.

“It is the will of this court that the child in question, Valentina Barbra Malloy, will become the child of Peter Malloy and the ward of Howard Brackett on this day, September 13th in Indianapolis, Indiana,” the judge declares and Howard feels probably the most heavy rush of excitement come over him. Once the gavel hits the block, the three of them become their own family.


End file.
